anne galloway
DESIGN IN THE
PARLIAMENT OF THINGS
design engaged
berlin 2005
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“To assemble is one thing; to represent to the eyes and ears of those assembled what is at stake is another.”
- Bruno Latour, From Realpolitik to Dingpolitik, or How to Make Things Public, 2005
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from Objects to Things
“Long before designating an object thrown out of the political
sphere and standing there objectively and independently, the Ding
or Thing has for many centuries meant the issue that brings people
together because it divides them…” - Bruno Latour
Etymology of thing: Middle English, from Old English, thing, assembly; akin to Old High German ding thing, assembly, Gothic
theihs time. The oldest assembly or parliament in the world is the Icelandic Althing (from 930 AD).
Latour warns us that reviving this sense of ‘thing’ is risky, not least because of its “uses and abuses” by Heidegger, but he needs it for
his concept of “ecologies of practice” (see Isabelle Stengers’ Cosmopolitics). This sense of assembly is also used to transform
Deleuze & Guattari’s “assemblage” into something politically and ethically actionable (“assemblies that can make sense of all those
assemblages”).
“The point of reviving this old etymology is that we don’t assemble because we agree, look alike, feel good, are socially
compatible or wish to fuse together but because we are brought by divisive matters of concern into some neutral, isolated place
in order to come to some sort of provisional makeshift (dis)agreement.” – Bruno Latour
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So the important thing to remember about assemblies or parliaments is that convergence is more highly valued than unity. The
process of (be)coming together is more highly valued than the product of consensus. This is the world in play.
These assemblies should also be understood to comprise both humans and non-humans, thinking and doing, words and things.
Although understood to be different, there is no assumption that these differences are opposite, opposing, or necessarily in
competition.
Etymology of object: Middle English, from Medieval Latin objectum, from Latin, neuter of objectus, past participle of obicere to
throw in the way, present, hinder, from ob- in the way + jacere to throw
Objective - of, relating to, or being an object, phenomenon, or condition in the realm of sensible experience independent of individual
thought and perceptible by all observers : having reality independent of the mind
from
matters-of-fact
to
matters-of-concern
In an assembly - in a parliament of things - design is not objective, not given, not matter-of-fact. Instead, design is a matter-ofconcern that requires the convergence of difference, of taking into account and being accountable to things that appear irrelevant or
contrary to our personal interests.
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from Realpolitik to Dingpolitik
“Because we ourselves are so divided by so many contradictory
attachments that we have to assemble…” - Bruno Latour
German realpolitik refers to “practical politics, in the sense that ideas and theories are unimportant and can be disregarded in the
conduct of political affairs.” Or, in other words, “politics based on practical rather than moral or ideological considerations.”
Latour argues that this sort of practicality has led to, amongst other things, a politics in which we expect too much from our
representatives. After all, how can we create ‘the body politic’ without reducing the interests and concerns of many by representing
them by - or as - one?
He suggests, instead, a dingpolitik, where matters-of-fact are replaced with matters-of-concern. Although mistakenly, I think,
comparing this to object-oriented programming (his “object-oriented democracy”), and writing only from the perspective of
contemporary European Union politics, I think that Latour offers us something of value here. Rather than bringing us together
because we have the same opinions or answers, Latour assembles us in our shared concerns and questions. The risk here, of course, is
that some people will not consider politics - assemblies and parliaments - to be matters of their (practical) concern.
(See also Alphonso Lingis’ The Community of Those Who Have Nothing in Common, Jean-Luc Nancy’s The Inoperative Community,
Maurice Blanchot’s The Unavowable Community, Zygmunt Bauman’s Community: Seeking Safety in an Insecure World and Liquid
Love: On the Frailty of Human Bonds, Giorgio Agamben’s Means Without End: Notes on Politics, State of Exception and Homo
Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life.)
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from representation to re-presentation
“We are asking from representation something it cannot possibly
give, namely representation without any re-presentation, without
any provisional assertions, without any imperfect proof, without
any opaque layers of translations, transmissions, betrayals, without
any complicated machinery of assembly, delegation, proof,
argumentation, negotiation and conclusion.” – Bruno Latour
I do not wish to represent as matters-of-fact design or users or even the social and cultural. I want to see what happens when we represent design, users, and even the social and cultural as matters-of-concern, as things in play.
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re-presenting Design
invention & capitalism
speed & mobilisation
If we start by thinking about things in play, we must take into account and be accountable to unequal forces around and between us.
All academic and design production takes place within the spaces of capitalism, where invention, innovation, originality - a.k.a. the
new - are highly prized. And for the past few decades, these spaces have increasingly been characterised in terms of speed and risk,
where mobilisation means to eliminate obstacles.
(See also: Michael Hardt & Antonio Negri’s Empire and Multitude, Paul Virilio’s Speed and Politics, Manuel De Landa’s A Thousand
Years of Nonlinear History, Joost Van Loon’s Risk in a Technological Age, Keller Easterling’s Enduring Innocence: Global
Architecture and Its Political Masquerades, Steve Graham’s edited volume Cities, War And Terrorism: Towards an Urban
Geopolitics and John McKenzie’s Perform or Else: From Discipline to Performance.)
The important thing, I think, to notice is that these spaces discourage assemblies. They create and maintain oppositional binaries like
work vs. play, thinking vs. making, us vs. other. To re-present design is, and will continue to be, a difficult endeavour. But I still
want to trouble these categories and assumptions. I want to continue to imagine different possibilities.
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re-presenting Design
“My dreams and hopes are turned towards any process which
would get people interested in the consequences coming
together and being able to impose their questions, objections,
counter-propositions. I do not ask that scientists as people
become better or more enlightened, I ask that practices stop
ignoring each other, stop creating practitioners judging away
what escapes their question.” - Isabelle Stengers, A ‘CosmoPolitics’ – Risk, Hope, Change, 2002
For our purposes, I would put academics, designers and engineers beside her scientists. And I, for one, accept her challenge.
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design in the Parliament of Things
“How do we manage to bring in the relevant parties? How do
we manage to bring in the relevant issues? What change does
it make in the way people make up their mind to be attached
to things?” – Bruno Latour
When we produce things, who are the relevant players (humans and non-humans) and what are the relevant issues? What would
happen if we brought in the irrelevant, the disabled, all the outliers, all the anomalies, and gave them seats in our parliaments? What
if we had to take into account and be accountable to that which is different from, or oppositional to, our interests? Would we produce
old or new things? Would we understand each differently? Would we expect something different from them or ourselves?
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design in the Parliament of Things
“That’s where the slowing down comes in – you can create
new habits only by slowing down, because new habits also
mean new feelings, new interests, new possibilities...”
– Isabelle Stengers
I believe in slowness and becoming together.
In a world of rapid prototyping and expectations of growth, I find it helpful to recall part of LEGO’s research and design process:
“We are not about rushing things because it frustrates the process of playful learning and developing…We stand for infinite options,
unbounded imagination and curiosity.”
If we slow down, get outside, on the ground, everyday, I think we can witness things in play, create provisional or situational
assemblies, become accountable to our differences in tactics and strategies, and build new worlds.
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Thank you
anne galloway
www.purselipsquarejaw.org
www.spaceandculture.org
11 november, 2005